The Allahabad High Court has reaffirmed that for a conviction under Section 304-B IPC, the prosecution must first prove by cogent evidence that the woman was subjected to cruelty or harassment by the accused in connection with dowry demand soon before her death. Only after those foundational facts are established does the presumption under Section 113-B of the Evidence Act arise. The Court clarified that this statutory presumption cannot be used to fill gaps where the prosecution has failed to prove the basic ingredients of dowry death against a particular accused.
Applying that principle, the Court held that the prosecution had succeeded in proving cruelty in connection with dowry demand against Abrar Ahmad, the husband, and that the unnatural death by strangulation within seven years of marriage attracted the presumption under Section 113-B of the Evidence Act against him. Since Abrar failed to discharge that burden, his conviction and sentence were affirmed.
At the same time, the Court held that the prosecution had failed to establish the same foundational facts against Lal Babu and Shabana Khatoon. In the absence of reliable evidence that they had subjected the deceased to cruelty in connection with dowry demand soon before her death, no presumption under Section 113-B could be raised against them. As a result, their convictions under Section 304-B/34 IPC, Section 498-A/34 IPC, and Section 4 of the Dowry Prohibition Act were unsustainable.
The Division Bench comprising Justice J.J. Munir and Justice Saurabh Srivastava drew a clear distinction between the case against the husband Abrar Ahmad and the case against the brother-in-law Lal Babu and sister-in-law Shabana Khatoon. It noted that the defence had led consistent evidence showing that Lal Babu and Shabana were living separately within the same premises, after a family partition brought about by the father due to strained relations between the two brothers. The Bench found that the trial court had failed to properly consider this defence evidence and had too readily accepted the omnibus allegations made through telephonic conversations with the deceased.
The Bench also noted that the deceased’s father, sister, and brother had only limited interaction with her matrimonial household, and most of their knowledge came from a few phone calls. Because of this limited contact, the Bench held that their allegations could more safely be relied upon against the husband, but not automatically against the brother-in-law and sister-in-law, especially when there was credible defence evidence of separate residence and estrangement. In the Court’s view, if anyone stood to gain from the dowry demand, it was the husband, and therefore the allegation of cruelty in connection with dowry demand could reasonably be confined to him.
A significant legal observation made by the High Court was that where the material justifies framing a charge under Section 302 IPC in a dowry death case, murder must be treated as the main charge and Section 304-B IPC as the alternative or succeeding charge, not the other way round. The Bench thus held that the trial court had erred in law by treating Section 302 IPC as an alternate charge and proceeding directly to examine the case only under Section 304-B IPC. However, since there was no appeal by the State or complainant for enhancement or alteration, the High Court said it could not place the accused in a worse position in an appeal filed by the convict alone.
Briefly, the criminal appeals arose from the death of Tajrun Khatoon, who had married Abrar Ahmad on June 29, 2013 and died in her matrimonial home within about four months of marriage. The prosecution case was that soon after marriage, Tajrun told her parental family over phone that her husband Abrar Ahmad, his brother Lal Babu, and sister-in-law Shabana Khatoon were demanding a motorcycle, a gold chain, and a gold ring as dowry, and were threatening and assaulting her when those demands were not met.
An FIR was registered on Oct 10, 2013 under Sections 498-A and 304-B IPC and Sections 3/4 of the Dowry Prohibition Act. The postmortem recorded the cause of death as asphyxia due to strangulation, with a ligature mark on the neck, fracture of the hyoid bone, and subcutaneous haemorrhage. After investigation, charge-sheets were filed against Abrar Ahmad, Lal Babu, and Shabana Khatoon, and the trial court ultimately convicted all three under Sections 304-B/34 and 498-A/34 IPC and Section 4 of the Dowry Prohibition Act, while acquitting them under Section 3 of the Act. Each was awarded life imprisonment for the offence under Section 304-B IPC, besides sentence under Section 4 of the Dowry Prohibition Act.
